


Hoping

by mutedtempest



Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: F/M, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-06-18
Updated: 2018-06-18
Packaged: 2019-05-24 20:24:53
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 880
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14961581
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/mutedtempest/pseuds/mutedtempest
Summary: At the end, Lotor reflects on his mistakes and the love he so wanted but could never let come to pass.





	Hoping

He’d been hoping. Against hope, as it were, but hoping nonetheless.

He should have learned thousands of years ago that anything he believed could actually come to fruition never would. He was simply not destined for such things as success, as happiness, as peace. The stars did not write lyrics for him as they did for others. And yet he would strive for them until his dying breath, these ideals that sparkled like sunlight on the water of a world he’d never inhabited, never called his own.

His dying breath was likely closer than he’d anticipated, if he were honest with himself. It was difficult to be; he’d been so dishonest with everything aside from his emotional armor that the pain coursing through him at her words was almost cold rather than searing. It did not matter. Nothing did, now.

His apology had not been enough. And yet he’d hoped, by some miracle beyond his comprehension, that it might change something. Might give her pause, a moment to analyze, to understand that he truly had never _wanted_ to harm anyone. Never. Not once. And yet it had been all he could do, to save any. 

He’d said it all, to that tiniest of data cells now housed in one of the crevices in Allura’s armor. What he’d been working on when he’d said he was attending to “imperial duties.” The only lie he had ever told her. 

That he was broken. Too broken to lead this Empire when the cracks in his soul were starting to show. Cracks she’d helped so much to mend. Had it been enough? Obviously not, as the blinding light around him verified ever time he opened his eyes to try to alleviate the searing pain in his head, in his heart. 

But he had tried. Hopeless as it was, he wanted it regardless. Peace. Connection. Something other than dismissal and scorn. A way to feel, truly feel, that the starlight and quintessence in him were of the same substances that flowed through her. Made her into the most gloriously, radiantly, painfully beautiful of any celestial occurrence he had ever had the privilege to behold.

He remembered her pain. The haunted look in her eyes as she’d heard what he’d done to the Alteans he’d saved. The colony he was attempting to preserve. And yet he’d foolishly hoped that he could make it right, make her understand, make her see. Instead she had spoken words in her anger and her heartbreak that had transformed him back into the very creature he had finally been beginning to believe he was beating. That could stay dead, to allow him to move toward happiness. 

He should have known better. Such things were not meant for the sons of tyrants and witches made zombies. Not for princes who had slaughtered thousands, millions. Not for the weak, the foolish, the unworthy of love. He was indeed exactly like his father, wanting nothing more than one thing. Yet his wish was never for power. It was for acceptance. Even more than peace, his heart ached for it.

Well. It was not to be. Not possible, when he’d shouted such hurtful things at her, at the Paladins, at his beloved friends who had stood by his side for centuries on end. He meant not a one. They were yet another defense, so he could stop this weakness. This…corruption in himself.

He had known, the second he’d told her that together they could make sure the power here did not corrupt. He had not expected it so soon. And truly, he was powerful here. But he was not the man who had entered, not the man Allura had loved. He did not know who or what he was now, but though it hurt that she had left him, he had wished it of her. 

Hurting them all could drive them back, make them hate him, make Ezor, Zethrid and Acxa leave him with the madness embedded in his very being. To make Voltron, make _Allura,_ angry enough to do away with him.

He had told her that, as well, on the data cell. That he truly wanted what she did, their shared vision of a peaceful universe. How he wished he could be there to witness it with her. How he regretted that she would likely be hurt, when she knew the truth. 

How that stung, now. In this prelude to death he was being given a moment of clarity, but he could feel the pressure building and was glad and thankful beyond measure that they had closed this place off, to keep this madness from the universe at large. He should have known better, but he was far too stupid and too much a dreamer. Always had been.

His breaths were wheezing; painful. Perhaps he could sleep. Rest, finally. It felt as thought it had been decaphoebes. Perhaps it had been. But he could do this no longer. Instead, he simply mouthed the final words he’d placed on the data cell before he shut his eyes and knew no more.

“I love you with everything I am and all the many things I wanted so badly to be. Forgive me, if you can, and find the love and happiness you so deserve.”

**Author's Note:**

> I'm sorry. This was hard to write, and I realize we'll likely never have something like him explaining, but i wanted to at least give Allura that here. To give Lotor some time to think through things before whatever end takes place does so. 
> 
> I don't forgive what he did on the colony. I don't think having him do it made any sense narratively, but since the showrunners were hellbent to turn him into a bad version of Azula for whatever reason, genocide was apparently the best option to them. 
> 
> As an abuse survivor I wanted so much more for him and am upset that it will never happen. But. This is at least something I could do.


End file.
